Marine monitoring

Parks Victoria has an extensive monitoring program across the network of Marine Protected Areas as part of the Signs of Healthy Parks Program (SHP).

The SHP program ensures a systematic, robust and integrated approach to ecological monitoring across the parks network. The SHP program provides a stronger evidence base to better inform management decisions. Building on Parks Victoria’s Adaptive Management Framework, the SHP program monitors the health of the parks using a range of environmental indicators that provide information about the natural assets and ecological processes in the parks as well as effects of threats and other drivers.

Since 2002, numerous monitoring surveys have been implemented in 11 marine national parks and 11 marine sanctuaries. This work has been targeted at collecting baseline biological information that will be used to understand long-term changes in populations, abundances, community structures and ecological processes.